Making gold out of green

When University of Michigan environmental science and business professor Andrew Hoffman was growing up in Norwood in the 1970s, environmental issues were just emerging into public consciousness.

Earth Day was first observed in 1970, and soon after the Environmental Protection Agency was established.

Hoffman, a 1979 Norwood High graduate, had no idea at the time his career path would lead to becoming an award-winning professor and author on business and environmental issues that are now becoming increasingly mainstream.

Hoffman recently teamed with John G. Woody, an associate at a renewable-energy firm in San Francisco to write "Climate Change: What's Your Business Strategy?", a book aimed at helping businesses save some green by becoming environmentally friendly.

The 97-page book, part of Harvard Business Publishing's "Memo to CEO" series and available through most major book stores, shows business leaders how climate change results in market changes and how businesses are profiting from becoming more environmentally friendly and adopting so-called "green" technologies.

Hoffman said changing consumer attitudes and government regulations are going to pressure companies to adopt more environmentally friendly operations. The book, he said, is a guide for executives to show how companies can profit from these changes.

"This isn't necessarily about doing the right thing, or being socially responsible," Hoffman said in a phone interview from his Ann Arbor office yesterday. "It's in the areas of consumer demand and cost of operations where the rubber really meets the road and having green buildings and more efficient operations means dollars saved."

During his lectures at the University of Michigan, Hoffman said he uses a simple example for students: washing machines.

"You can buy a baseline washer for $400 bucks, or a top-of-the-line energy efficient model for $1,100 bucks," said Hoffman. "That $700 different makes a lot of people balk, but they haven't done what's called a net present value calculation that businesses do that would show them that for an average family of four here in Michigan, it would take only 4.5 years to get that money back, which is not a bad turnaround. For a family in California, it would take only 1.2 years."

Using similar logic, the book cites examples of many high-profile companies that are looking at ways to save money by using less energy, doing more recycling, or using alternative energy sources.

Hoffman first dipped his toe into the pool of environmental science while attending the Prescott Elementary School in Norwood.

He recalls doing a report on Earth Day and pollution, but said his real interest wasn't sparked until he was getting a degree in chemical engineering at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst when news of the Love Canal environmental disaster in Niagara Falls, N.Y., hit the news. The disaster, in which a housing development was built on an old chemical waste site with disastrous health effects, caught Hoffman's attention.

"I decided I wanted to try to do something to make sure something like that never happened again," said Hoffman.

Hoffman graduated and joined the Environmental Protection agency for two years until he grew frustrated.

"I hated it," Hoffman recalls.

He took a job as a carpenter, building high-end custom homes on Nantucket before going back into the academic world, getting a master's and a doctorate in business and environmental engineering from MIT.

Hoffman is now a professor at the Ross School of Business and associate director of the Frederick A. and Barbara M. Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise at Michigan University.

Hoffman said he misses living in New England - he's been in Ann Arbor for four years - but loves working with students who show great enthusiasm for environmental issues.

"You can see it in students now, the energy and enthusiasm, and they really have the potential to do some amazing things in this field," said Hoffman. "When I got into this field, there weren't a lot of opportunities, but now there are opportunities everywhere and a lot of venture capital money is out there, too."

But he still has a warm spot in his heart for Norwood, where his parents, Kay and Joe, reside on Hemlock Street, and he continues to follows local news, particularly the Norwood High School building saga.

"If it gets rebuilt, I certainly hope they plan ahead and use some of these green technologies because this is where everything is going," said Hoffman.

Daily News staff writer Brian Falla can be reached at 781-433-8339 or at bfalla@cnc.com